Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Nov 02, 2019 2:52 pm
Okay, now. I've left it long enough for people to weigh in if they want to.
There are a lot of points that need to be made here. The first, and most important, is to realize that the Equality Feminist explanation and the Uniqueness Feminist explanation are rationally totally mutually-excluding, totally mutually contradictory.
This can be seen because if there is ANY feature that is essential in women that is not also present in men, then it is not true that there is NO such feature. There is no alternate view rationally possible. One or the other is true; not both, and not neither.
So far, so good?
Now, this obviously has massive implications for Feminism itself, and for sex-roles in society. But I don't want to bark up that tree right now, and will let others do it if they wish.
My real question is about transsexualism, not Feminism.
It seems to me that this realization makes clear that transsexualism
cannot be made rational.
Let's start out by identifying the two polarities of transsexualism. There is the base gender (BG) and the target gender (TG). The transsexual has been born or raised in the BG, but claims he/she needs to become the TG.
But if the "equality of genders" hypothesis is true, then this is wrong. There IS no TG. And there IS no BG. All there is, is two "false" genders, which hide the deep fact that men and women are not essentially different, all apparent differences have been socially constructed, resulting in oppression and false thinking. So what we all ought to be is unisex, undifferentiated by gender, or commonly just "human."
In that case, the best advice to an allegedly transgender person is to forget gender altogether, and become unisex. There would be no merit in encouraging him/her to leave his/her BG, which is an illusion anyway, and make the effort to take on the TG, which is also another illusion. Mental health would lie in the direction of everyone being unisex.
That's argument 1, consistent with Equality Feminism.
On the other hand, let us suppose that gender essentialism is correct.
If this is so, the transgender person CANNOT move from the BG to the TG, because some set of completely unobtainable features, from the BG starting point, will inhere in the TG. The BG will have essential qualities. So will the TG. And someone with the essential qualities of the BG will simply find it impossible to reach the TG.
In that case, mental health lies in the direction of encouraging the allegedly transgendering person to recognize that he/she is mentally ill or deluded in some way. Only when he/she gives up the aspiration to have the essence of what he/she simply can never have will he/she be able to be healthy.
That's argument 2, consistent with Uniqueness Feminism, and with Gender Essentialism, which seems to be the view that the majority here thinks is also right.
Conclusion
So either way -- whether we believe in Gender Essentialism or refuse to believe in it, the rationally compassionate decision regarding transpeople is to help them to see that it's not rational or healthy for them to continue to attempt to become the TG -- for Equality Feminism says it's a false goal, and Uniqueness Feminism says it's impossible.
